


melting point

by hikaie



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Military, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Anxiety Attacks, Bittersweet Ending, Loss of Limbs, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-14
Updated: 2017-06-14
Packaged: 2018-11-14 05:21:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11201316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hikaie/pseuds/hikaie
Summary: He feels that there is some sort of cosmic irony in having known Shiro for years. Shiro had known all along and still gone off to war. He'd gone off and gotten himself captured and likely killed and left Keith with a dead name on his finger.





	melting point

**Author's Note:**

> This is a piece I wrote for the Sheith Charity Zine awhile back. There's one or two edits that made it into the final piece for the zine that aren't here but they're not monumental. I'm glad to have been part of such a generous and important project. In the zine I went by a pseudonym I rarely use as I wanted to kind of fly under the radar a bit but I felt like posting this now. This was kind of tough for me... I had a really grand idea and had to smoosh it down into 1500 words. :x
> 
> I think it's a little confusing, so the premise for my soulmate AU is that on someone's 21st birthday, the name of their soulmate appears as a tattoo on their ring finger.
> 
> Anyway, I hope you all enjoy, and thanks to everyone who supported the zine and by extension Beyond Blue. :) We couldn't have done it without you!
> 
> (Rated T for a very brief mention of torture and canonical loss-of-limb; otherwise, this is a pretty G-rated story.)

_Shiro,_

_I hope you’re doing ok. Thanks for the birthday wishes in your last letter. Early as they were. I don’t really know what to write in these? Dr. Holt keeps telling these wistful stories to us about his old TA. As if we weren’t in OChem I last semester with you?_

_I probably don’t need to tell you but… stay safe._

_I need my chem tutor intact. Y’know._

_Keith_

The worst part might be that Keith wakes up two weeks after the fact with Shiro’s name wrapped around his left ring finger.

_Today’s session is quieter. Chemistry is finally starting to make real sense to him, especially after having had Shiro's help all semester. The library is warm and quiet but for the sound of the vent beneath their table pumping out heat. The airflow creates a delicate white noise interrupted only by Keith chewing on his eraser and Shiro flipping the pages of his textbook. He clears his throat._

_“I got orders.” Shiro says, a moment later._

_The pencil hits the table, cacophonous in the silence._

Keith buys himself a ring for his birthday.

 

The likelihood of finding one’s soulmate is a million to one, or some real statistic Keith has never bothered to memorize due to the rarity of the thing. There are millions of people that never find the right person, regardless of the name on their finger. It’s a big world with often-insurmountable barriers. Keith’s parents hadn’t been soulmates, biological nor adoptive. It’s an accepted fact of life.

He feels that there is some sort of cosmic irony in having known Shiro for years. Although he’d seen the cover-up ring on his finger Keith had at no point thought to ask after the name beneath it. Yet Shiro had never divulged the information either. Keith feels betrayed, a sucking hurt in his gut and chest. Shiro had known all along and still gone off to war. He'd gone off and gotten himself captured and likely killed and left Keith with a dead name on his finger.

Even after a month the news can’t leave well enough alone. The captions scroll out of sync with the audio on the television in the Jiffy Lube waiting room. He watches while waits for his oil to be changed. The loss of American lives is still something to talk about, but then it’s on to a cheap bit about a local petting zoo. He clenches his hands against his thighs, still watching the late marquee _: missing in action… presumed dead… death count rising…_

He rises from his seat like from a fog when his name is called. Sitting in his car with his hands on the wheel, he comes to himself. He’s forced to face his ring. It’s a standard cover-up, boring, twenty bucks at Target.

It’s better than seeing the name beneath it.

_The chill of stone is a relief where it meets his skin, his right arm throbbing in time to his heartbeat. It aches with infection left to fester in a torture half his own body’s creation and half his captor’s. He’s learned to tune out the breathing and muffled noises of other prisoners in the black hole of the cell. In his mind, Shiro keeps up an unending litany, an apology to everyone he’s left behind._ Mom and Mom and Katie and Dr. Holt and- Holt, Matt, Holt- and Keith and _-_

_He thumbs the bare spot at the base of his left ring finger, a dead habit with no ring left to spin._

Akira. _He adds to his list._ I’m sorry Akira _._

Keith clutches the paper in his hand, disbelieving. “This is a joke, right?”

The guy behind him peeks over his shoulder and whistles, conciliatory.

Keith covers the big, red D with his thumb and shoves past his classmate. He storms out of the lecture hall in a whirlwind of fury and overwhelming anxiety. He knows he won’t make it back to his room. His panic increases at the mere thought of breaking down in the middle of campus.

Bathroom, then.

He shakes and presses his face between his knees, tries to breathe  _one-two-three-four_. Keith hasn’t gotten a D in five years, not since a test in his sophomore year of high school. It’s a grade; it’s just a grade. He pushes his hair off of his forehead and scrubs the tears out of his eyes. His breathing peters out with a few resounding hiccupping noises.

He attempts to unlatch the stall quietly. He meets someone’s eyes in the mirror, and they make a hasty retreat. He sags back against the stall door and looks at himself, blotchy face, red eyes, hair a mess.

He balls up the test and throws it away.

 

His parents are only slightly less disappointed in him when he joins the army than when he’d dropped out of college.

 

Basic is different, grounding and pressuring all at once. He can’t let his emotions guide him into that familiar place, that spiral of anger. Not in most situations.  He stands straight, folds his corners just right, and doesn’t say a word when yelled at for improperly tying his shoelaces. It’s times like when he’s dragging himself through the mud in full gear that he taps into the heat. All the resentment floods out of him, the wave pushing him ahead of the others as if to say,  _look at me. Look at what I can do_ _. Look at all my might._

“ _Patience_.” Says a voice in his head, like he’s looking at a particularly challenging molecular weight equation.

Keith keeps pushing ahead.

 

He has the day off, but he’s so used to his schedule that he wakes up at 5:45 in the morning. The coffee maker starts its automatic drip and he listens to the news on the clock radio while he showers. There’s a cold front approaching from the north. Keith presses his face into the tile and enjoys the hot water.

The phone rings when he’s stirring Sweet n’ Low into his second cup of coffee. He checks the caller ID and lifts the phone to his ear. “Mrs. Takashi?” A pop song plays on the radio in the background, an inaudible white noise of rehearsed lines.

“ _What_?” The spoon clatters in the mug.

 

Katie’s face is a barely concealed mask of hurt, though he doesn’t fault her. She was always straightforward. He'd never dare to imagine the relief of seeing him would overshadow her grief for the loss of her brother.

“It  _is_  good to see you again, Takashi.” She says, quietly. Almost as if she’d read his mind. She’s the first familiar face he’s seen stateside in weeks, aside from his parents. The first friend he’s seen in almost eighteen months. He swallows thickly.

“You too.” He musters up a smile; it’s not dishonest, but it is difficult.

“Can I stay awhile?”

“Of course.” He says, an uncaring permission, when what he really wants to say is, _yes, absolutely._

Keith feels as if he’s been having one twelve-hour-long cardiac event since he received the call, which only increases in severity as he takes the elevator up to the fifth floor. Shiro’s moms wait for him at the nurse’s station, their familiar faces crowding in around him for hugs.

“Hello, dear.”

“He’s asleep now.”

“We haven’t told him.”

“Would you like to see him?”

It all hits him at once, and he blinks, trying to process. He barks out a dry laugh at the last question, and nods. He thinks he’d like to see little else for the rest of his life.

 

He’s sleeping when Keith steps into the room. Keith takes the moment to drink him in, like a man parched from the desert. He’s broader than he’d expected, and paler. Premature gray streaks the front of his hair where it lies against the pillow. They’d told Keith about his arm but nothing prepares him for the sight of the stump. He sucks in a breath and holds it.

Keith approaches the bed, knees weak, and sits in the chair on the left side. He wants to look, Shiro’s bare hand calling to him. Does he see a K? He touches his ring, suddenly self-conscious.

There’s a sharp inhale and Shiro twitches. Keith jerks back, and their eyes meet. Shiro’s are filled with a momentary panic that is slowly replaced with recognition. A smile lights upon his lips, though it’s slow to come. “Keith. Hello.”

Keith’s stomach seems to turn into itself, heart palpating wildly. He smiles back. “Hi.”

“ _Patience_.” A voice in his head tells him when he goes to thumb off his ring.

_Screw that_. He thinks as he pulls it off.

He’s not going to waste another second.


End file.
